Concrete Jungle Where Dreams are Made of
by Arowen12
Summary: The streets shift beneath his feet, the alleyways widen or narrow depending on the fight, there's always a passing citizen to call the police, and it feels instinctive and easy to move through the city. He's always known Brooklyn, known it like the back of his hand and all the way up to his forearm but this is different, it's more.


Hello everyone, here again with a quick one-shot. This was mostly inspired by Hetalia and Paris Burning by thecitysmith (also the title is from that Alicia Keys song). I hope you all enjoy, read on!

Spiderman is the property of Marvel

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Peter doesn't realize what he's feeling for a long time, it's a dull sort of humming, beneath the skin, behind your heart, in the souls of your feet. At first, he thinks it's his spider-sense, that there's some hidden danger lurking around the corner of every street as he pushes the cart at the grocery store with Aunt May.

But it's more than that.

The streets shift beneath his feet, the alleyways widen or narrow depending on the fight, there's always a passing citizen to call the police, and it feels instinctive and easy to move through the city. He's always known Brooklyn, known it like the back of his hand and all the way up to his forearm but this is different, it's more.

Peter heals faster, faster even than super-power accelerated healing. He breaks his arm one day in a fight against Doc Oc, the next day there's nothing not even residual pain or a scar to mar his body. It's strange and concerning, and weird all at once.

So, Peter goes to the lab, turns to science and theory. He's seen his DNA under a microscope, a strange mix of human and spider. It's still the same, there's nothing different. Peter has a panic attack and moves on, he wonders if it's some form of secondary evolution but there's nothing to suggest it.

He feels the Lizard before he sees him, feel the crunch of his clawed feet on the pavement of his streets, feels the danger like a fire sparked beneath his skin burning from the inside out. He tugs on his mask and goes, the streets seem to move beneath him, forcing Peter faster and closer to the epicentre of the attack.

The Lizard has a bomb, and a hostage, she's young and the daughter of the Lizard's former co-worker, she's still in high school. Peter swings in and they fight, it's fast and hard, the Lizard is bigger and stronger than him and Peter collapses into a building with a crack of his ribs. He gets up and it isn't easy, but it feels as if the city is pushing him up as if the rubble shifts away on its own, and the pavement bends beneath his feet.

The bomb goes off, Peter makes sure it's away from any civilians, the bomb squad is still three blocks away, and he knows he can't stop it. So, he webs the Lizard and places it in an old abandoned building set for demolition (he wonders at the back of his mind how he knows all of this) and it explodes. He feels the shockwave somewhere in his legs, but he can't focus on that, he needs focus on the Lizard.

After it's over, and the Lizard is in the special cuffs designed for mutants, Peter turns to the hostage, her name is Lindsay, she thanks him, and he lets her take a selfie as she's bundled into a shock blanket. It's over and Peter sways in the aftermath of the adrenaline, his ribs feel like they're bruised and all he wants is to eat Aunt May's cooking and curl under the covers.

But he can't. He still needs to patrol and there's a paper he has due tomorrow for his class on biochemical engineering. He swings into the air knowing the police can handle transporting the Lizard, the streets part beneath him as he skips over rooftops and into a side alley.

There's an old woman, kind face, kind smile, her name is Sarah Burke, immigrant from Italy, moved here in 1947, lives with her husband, two children, three grandchildren. The information slips into his mind unwarranted as he webs the attempted mugger and helps her carry her groceries home. She says everything he already knows.

Peter becomes used to it, the dull hum at the back of his mind, it warns him sometimes of a large traffic accident, or of a heavy blizzard, or simpler things like the girl about to be hit by the car, or their neighbour who wants to commit suicide. Peter can't always listen to it, in between the moments of his daily life, but he tries.

There's a fire. It tears through an entire suburb in a day, burns through gardens, and couches, and tv's and the nearby suburb catches with the same ferocity. Peter's skin burns, sores split open along his ribs, they bleed and burn, it's painful and Peter needs to be out there helping the firefighters in whatever way possible. But he can't. The fire is burning, seeping everywhere and he can see it behind his eyelids.

Aunt May finds him like that, blood staining the sheets, and him writhing in pain. She smooths his hair back and hums a lullaby from when he was young, in those first few nights after the crash. In between the hazy delirium she speaks of meeting a young man on her visit to Paris, who seemed to know the city like the back of his head, kind, charming, but grieving. She speaks of him in a way that is half knowing as she brushes back his hair and presses a kiss to his forehead.

In the aftermath, Peter has a faint scar on his ribs, it's shiny and white, and he knows (he feels) it will fade once they rebuild that part of the city. In the meantime, he grieves all the lives lost in the fire, those who have lost their homes and all their possessions.

His friends don't notice, and he doesn't tell. It's just one more part of his life tangled up between his secret identity and the overwhelming pressure of school.

When Deadpool appears it's like an earthquake, it spreads and tingles beneath his feet, like pins and needles. He helps him with his mission and only settles when the Merc leaves his city. When Daredevil enters Brooklyn in pursuit of a gang, Peter swings in and helps, he notices Daredevil, he's like the first rain of spring trying to clean up the old grey snow. The fight ends and he remains a distant awareness when he enters Hell's Kitchen.

The awareness spreads, ever so slightly, one day he swings past the Empire State Building and he knows there is a robbery happening a street away and the man has a gun. It's fainter, quieter than the presence at the back of his head but still a part of him.

People leave first-aid-kits on their balconies, lunch bags with non-perishable snacks. The vendors in the street pass him food and he talks to them, listens to their stories, to the local gossip. He talks to his citizens, the people, about their neighbours and the grocery store, the local scandal at the high school. He plays with children in the park and jokes with adults about a babysitting service. He's in the suit most of the time, but sometimes he's just Peter Parker. And it feels right.

The portal opening above New York brings him to his knees with a sense of doom like a shroud, he's suited up a moment later and texting the police to begin evacuation measures to the south, they're going to target the west end north end. The Avengers are like the sun, they're like gravity and he feels them like a conscious pull as he swings towards the portal and the bright purple things spewing from it.

It's brutal, not because the aliens are hard to take down, they're almost ridiculously easy (there's a lot of them though) it's the destruction they cause to his streets, to his infrastructure. Peter coughs up blood, bleeds through his costume from his thigh to his knee, he keeps swinging, keeps webbing the aliens to the pavement.

Iron Man asks if he's okay, Captain Rogers tells him to get off the battlefield and seek medical, Black Widow watches his back throughout the fight like an overprotective mom, Hawkeye questions him if he's okay and tries to bribe him with fries (it almost works), the Hulk smashes and it just joins the constant pain. He can keep fighting so, he does.

After the battle is over, Peter sits on a piece of rubble and tries to breathe through the blood filling his mouth, it's coppery and everything hurts, not just in the sore muscle sort of way, it's something a bit deeper lying beneath the bedrock.

Iron Man appears again, he stares at Peter in concern, the helmet folded back over his face. He offers medical attention, secrecy guaranteed, and he knows they're just concerned. Peter wants to take the offer but can't, He already knows Stark is going to look at the footage from battle and see that Peter wasn't hit once. The thought of him knowing, of any of them knowing feels dangerous.

Peter goes home and sleeps as the city tries to rebuild itself.

He dies, a bullet wound right near his heart that he won't survive. Peter's okay with it, he knew that the hero business was dangerous, he made peace with it the moment he really donned the mask. He webs the mugger, escorts the woman out of the alleyway and crumbles into an empty one. He wishes he could say goodbye to his Aunt but, she's known the danger of what he does, and MJ will take care of her.

Peter dies in three minutes and thirty seconds. Peter wakes exactly one minute later with his chest heaving and the bullet falling to the asphalt with a heavy clang. Peter trails his fingers over his chest and his breathing is sharp, he can't catch it, can only sit there curled in on himself for who knows how long (he wonders if he's become Deadpool, it doesn't feel like the answer).

May takes one look at him and hugs him close, lets him sob and cry till he feels like a dried-out husk and everything's a bit clearer. He needs to figure this out, and he doesn't know how or what to do.

The answer finds him first. Peter is battling what could probably be a demon's really ugly cousin when Doctor Strange appears and banishes the thing back to whence it came (or whatever) which, Peter is beyond grateful for because he was sort of struggling. But then Doctor Strange stops and stares at Peter stares for a really long moment before he makes a sound like when you finally find the word you've been looking for and invites Peter out for coffee.

Peter chooses the place, it's small, run by a couple born and raised in Brooklyn who respect people's privacy, the food is also to die for. They settle in a booth at the back and Peter thanks him for the help with the demon-thing, Strange (call me Stephen) dismisses it and stares at Peter, who thanks the waitress and asks about her kid, who listens with a smile and lets her take their orders.

"You're New York."

The words come out like a hammer to the anvil, they fall into his minds with a sense of right so deep that Peter can't breathe for a moment, can't see anything but him, New York (but mostly Brooklyn). Stephen nods once, and his eyes are soft and curious and empathetic all at once.

"There are beings, sometimes people who become, a representation of a city, they aren't inordinately powerful, but death does not find them easily, and the city is them so naturally, it bends towards their will. Naturally, the last New York died in the early 2000s. I suspected but…"

Stephen trailed off and Peter sipped at his drink in silence as the waitress returned with their food. It was delicious but it sat like a stone in his stomach as he thought over the words, they were right. He was New York. New York was him.

"Thanks, I don't think I would have figured it out on my own. There are others out, there right?"

Stephen nods and they eat, and the air isn't quite tense anymore. Once they're finished, and Cathy's taken the plates away, Peter pauses and asks gently, "Please don't tell anyone."

It's important, he can feel it. If people know who New York is, they'll try to sway him, kidnap him, anything. There's something powerful in him for all its ordinariness and Peter already knows what comes with great power. Stephen nods, he steeples his hands under his chin and replies, "Of course, you have my word. If you ever need anything feel free to visit the Sanctum."

He departs and pays the bill (what a gentleman), Peter sits in the dinner for a long time afterwards. Eventually, Peter leaves the diner, he pauses to talk to a group of teenagers who are lost, warns a mother about the man watching them, and stops a kid from running in front of a truck. It feels right, to protect his citizens, to walk his streets and help them. Peter is New York and he's okay with that.

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Thank you all for reading, I hope you enjoyed this fic, it was pretty interesting to write. Reviews/comments are always appreciated!


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